Janissary and Samurai Warriors
by Rit NosotroComparative Essay
Ottoman Janissary and Japanese Samurai - Alike or Not?
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Summary:
I visited the magnificent Topeki Palace in Istanbul and had as my guide a young Muslim man.
One of the first rooms in the Palace contained armor from various periods of the Ottoman
Empire. As I looked at the final display, I was very surprised to see what looked to me
like Japanese armor. The tour guide said that it was samurai armor. A ship was sent to
Turkey in the late 1800's with gifts from Japan, and Turkey responded with gifts of
Janissary equipment in return. Unfortunately, according to the guide, the Turkish ship sank
in route. The guide then made a surprising comment that Janissary soldiers and samurai
soldiers were much alike. I decided to compare Janissary soldiers with samurai soldiers,
concentrating mainly on the Janissary soldiers.
Janissaries were the elite fighting corps of the Ottoman Empire. They were originally
formed by Sultan Murad I around 13306
. Originally the units were composed of war captives and slaves from non-Muslim, Christian
background. Boys between 7 and 14 were forcibly taken from their homes to be trained for
six years1. They were trained with
strict discipline and hard labor under monastic conditions6. A janissary soldier became a Muslim and followed the rules of the
dervish saint Haji Bektash. They were not allowed to grow a beard like other Muslims and
wore long, white headdresses. They were to not marry and could not take up a trade. The
only personal possession a janissary had was a cooking pot, which was also a symbol of the
janissaries. The commander of the janissaries was the First Soup Maker, and his deputy was
the First Cook1.In theory Janissaries
belonged to the Sultan and were called kapikulu ("door slave") by him. The sultan could
depend on them because they did not have other loyalties to family, wives, or professions.
Every major campaign of the Ottoman Empire used Janissaries soldiers led by the Sultan,
including the capture of Constantinople in 14533.
By the early 18th century Janissaries had such prestige and influence that they dominated
the government3. In 1449 they revolted
for the first time and demanded higher wages, which they received. In 1 566 Sultan Selim II
gave Janissaries permission to marry. In 1807 they deposed Sultan Selim III because of his
efforts to modernize the army2. As they
began to demand more and more pay and had other loyalties to wives and possessions, they
became less and less trustworthy. Beginning in 1846 Mahmud II forced the Janissaries to
retreat to their barracks and within two years had completely destroyed and disbanded them.
Samurai were the upper class of Japanese society, and the word samurai originally meant
"those who serve in close attendance to nobility"4. They were well, trained disciplined warriors and followed
Buddhist, Zen and Confucius philosophies and a strict code of conduct called 'bushido".
Well-educated, they wore a top-knot of hair to show their samurai status and owed complete
loyalty to their lord. They had arranged marriages with someone in their own class. In the
12th-century the samurai gained power during the wars between the Taira and Minamoto clans.
During the Japanese feudal period on into Tokugawa's reign, they played an important role in
governing and in society, but in the late 1800's power was put in an emperor's hands and
taken from the samurai. Emperor Meiji abolished the samurai's right to be the only armed
forces in favor of a more modern style army.
At first glance there are significant similarities between Janissaries and samurai soldiers.
They were both elite fighting forces. Both did not fight for their own aims, but owed
loyalty to their rulers. The Janissaries fought for the sultan and the samurais fought for
their daimyo or ruling lord. Both were trained with multiple weapons rather than just one
like archers or footmen, making them valuable in battle. Both wore distinctive hair styles,
the Janissaries with no beards and the samurai with their topknot of hair, and they followed
very disciplined rules for life and training for battle. Both groups were honored when
there was a time of war but were dangerous and costly during peace time1. This added to their main similarity,
which lay in their downfalls. Each of them became too powerful and threatened the rule of
the leaders of their countries. Janissaries had deposed sultans and because they began
marrying and taking jobs as craftsmen, they no longer owed loyalty only to their sultan, the
original purpose of their formation. Samurai also had a lot of power and respect, and
because they supported the traditional, isolated ways, they threatened the leadership's
ability to bring Japan into the modern world.
Their differences were quite distinct, however. Samurai were of the highest class in Japan.
They were aristocrats and thus powerful in their own right. Janissaries, on the other hand,
were of the outcast, infidel Christians, and they were brought into the society. Though
they became Muslims, they were not on equal standing with native Muslims because they did
not grow beards. Becoming a Janissary was a way for a non-Muslim to move up in society but
he would never be consisted an aristocrat. Samurai aimed to gain personal honor5, but this was never an important part of
being a Janissary. Janissary lived together in barracks and samurai lived on their own
properties or that of their various lords. Another significant difference was that samurai
married and had children and had personal possessions4. There were even women samurai, but one could never imagine a
woman Janissary. Janissaries originally did not marry nor would their families inherit any
wealth for them. The fall of the Janissaries owed a great to the fact that later in their
history they began to marry, own property, and so their complete loyalty and dependence on
the sultan weakened.
When Janissaries and samurais gave their complete loyalty to their lords, they
were the most useful and proved to be a strong backbone of their societies. They
well represented how we as Christians should relate to our Lord God. However,
when the Janissaries and the samurai began to do what seemed good in their own
eyes, their destruction soon followed. As the Bible tells us in Deuteronomy 11:22,23,
"If you carefully observe all these commands I am giving you to follow-to love
the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways and to hold fast to him then the LORD
will drive out all these nations before you, and you will dispossess nations larger
and stronger than you. However, when they went their own ways, they were eventually
destroyed." It was the unwillingness of both the Janissaries and the samurais
to follow their lords and keep themselves pure according to their own standards
that eventually destroyed them. My guide in the Topeki Palace had correctly pointed
out that Janissaries and samurai were alike - especially in their downfall.
2 Kjeilen, Tore. "Selim 3" Encyclopedia of the Orient, LexicOrient, 1996-2006, www.i-cias.com/e.o/s28-selim3.htm (6 October 2006).
3 NA. "Janissary" www.answers.com/topic/janissary (6 October 2006).
4 NA. "Samurai" www.answers.com/topic/samurai (6 October 2006).
5 Turnbull, Stephen. Knights and Samurai- Brothers in Arms? Ospry Publishing, 2003, http://www.ospreysamurai.com/knights.html (6 October 2006).
6 Vaughan, Brian K. "Janissary.info," 2005, http://www.janissary.info/index.html (6 October 2006).
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